


with love

by wigglebox



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Canon Compliant, Dean's a sad boi, Dreams vs. Reality, Literal Sleeping Together, M/M, Pining, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-10-15
Packaged: 2020-12-16 20:37:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21042425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wigglebox/pseuds/wigglebox
Summary: to yearn intensely and persistently especially for something unattainable





	with love

Before, all three of them had gotten into a routine before everything blew up and a normal night consisted of: someone reading a book, someone watching a movie or TV show, dinner, some drinks, some snacks. Bedtime was anywhere between midnight and two in the morning, depending on how much energy they spent that day and how much they drank. A goodnight, another goodnight, and a third goodnight -- bed. 

Those nights were the good nights. Those nights were when Dean could maybe get five hours of sleep if he was lucky. The best part of those nights was when he could hear the laptop speakers on the other side of the wall. 

Cas was still there, just beyond the drywall. 

It was those private moments, laying in bed, that Dean allowed his mind to wander to lands where he didn’t feel guilty or scared. On those nights, he allowed his imagination to bring him into a restful sleep. It was the only time he’d let his thoughts go there, where maybe he _wasn’t _alone in his room and a wall separated them.

Maybe there would be someone in bed next to him, the mattress dipping in that all too familiar way when you had night time company, wanted and needed. What way would they sleep? Facing you or back to you? Needed space or practically on top of each other, unable to discern limb from limb. 

That one was scenario Dean favored. As the speakers provided white noise through the walls, and sometimes a muffled laugh, his sleep soaked brain that pulled him further into the void often embraced a certain scene:

Both of them heavy with sleep, because Cas could sleep now -- How? Didn’t matter, he could, and that’s all that Dean focused on. Logic had no home in the mind in those early morning hours. 

So they would be heavy with sleep, energy drained from the day, and all they wanted to do was crawl under the sheets, not do anything complicated or illicit. It was innocent enough, despite the lack of clothing imagined. 

The bedside light would stay on, but all others were turned off. The light allowed them both to take in the scene around them before slipping under. Their skin, whatever remained uncovered, was cast in a golden light, more illuminated than the real-life lamp could ever do. Some nights, lips may run over that skin, a mouth leaving marks as it trailed along, like breadcrumbs. Other nights, it was just them staying still, quiet and breathing, no other sounds around them. 

Dean long worked out the positions in which their bodies would rest, and the scene had been burned in his mind for several years now. 

He was always laying on his back, a position he didn’t like to be in usually but in this case, he felt safe enough to take the risk. Dean knew that if he opened his eyes, there’d be no horrors on the ceiling or a menacing monster looming over him with their claws out, teeth bared. Instead, just a normal speckled, white ceiling, dark other than their little corner where the light was. The beam seemed more focused on him and Cas and nothing else. It was like their bodies were light-catchers. 

If Dean turned his head a little to the right, another face would be there, resting on the pillow but so close that eyelashes would brush against Dean’s jaw. An arm slithered itself under pillows, and another one draped over Dean’s body, moving up and down as they breathed. 

He was secured. 

And that’s when Dean would fully slip into a content sleep, in his real-life, dark bedroom with no presence in his bed, instead just something to take with him as a safety blanket into dreamland. 

But now. 

_Now_

What little Dean had left of his life shattered in his hands. It was like a domino effect that finally found the end, and the end was a lava pit that destroyed anything that fell into it. 

Cas was gone, tense words and complicated emotions no one wanted to deal with now eventually pushing him out. Dean did nothing to stop it and didn’t realize what truly happened until the door slammed shut, and Sam wouldn’t look him in the eye. 

The illusion splintered, and Dean that night, lying awake in bed as the clock rounded to midnight, felt the gates shut as firmly as that door with no key to be found.

He was alone.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was kind of prompted by @softcuddlydean on Twitter, based off a cute thing but I wanted to make it sad, because, that's just where we are right now. 
> 
> Slight spoilers only based on the fact of Cas leaving (theorized in episode 3 but could be whenever).
> 
> (unbeta'd, any issues please kindly let me know!)
> 
> Tumblr - Wigglebox


End file.
